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Georgia, Iraq, and Athenian Justice

Adil E. Shamoo and Bonnie Bricker | September 9, 2008

Editor: Erik Leaver

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Foreign Policy In Focus

"Justice only enters where there is equal power to enforce it ... [W]e have a right to rule ... the powerful exact what they can, and the weak grant what they must."

While the Bush administration may disagree, this ancient Athenian quote applies equally to the Russian invasion of Georgia on August 8, 2008 and Bush's invasion of Iraq in 2003.

This statement was originally addressed to the leaders and residents of the small Greek island of Melos 2,439 years ago. The Athenians invaded Melos to prevent the possibility of future hostile actions. The Athenians killed all men of military age (about 600 of them) and enslaved the rest. While some may disdain such a brutal approach, others will recognize that this philosophy is the same as the United States under Bush's, and now Russia's, approach to modern foreign policy.

Over the course of history, states with great power do what they want. If moral reasoning happens to support their action they will use it, but it is not necessary. As seen in Iraq and now in Georgia, states can easily manufacture reasons for military action. This is not new. One of the most infamous uses of Hitler's intellectuals justified heinous crimes against humanity by publishing thousands of books and articles demonizing Jews and others that they considered to be the children of lesser gods.

Reading from the Athenian playbook, the Russians demonized the Georgians by declaring the Georgians to be the aggressors, claiming that they were committing genocide against ethnic Russians. It did not help that the bombastic, reckless leader of Georgia was first to invade the separatist South Ossetians. The two disputed regions — South Ossetia and Abkhazia — were semi-autonomous regions with Russian "peacekeepers" stationed in them. Instead of using diplomatic persuasion and the United Nations to resolve the issues of these semi-autonomous regions in Georgia, the Russians invaded Georgia instead. A few short weeks later the President of Russia, Dmitry Medvedev, announced that Russia was recognizing South Ossetia and Abkhazia's independence.

Seeking their own brand of Athenian justice, the Russians wanted to teach a lesson to the Georgians and send a powerful message to other former Soviet Union countries such as Ukraine. The Russians put on display that their military can exact what they want and the weak Georgians (and other outlying regions) will grant what they must.

But the Russians didn't have to look back to ancient times to learn how to invade another country. In 2003, the United States set a powerful example in demonizing the Iraqi government and many of its people. Bush and his advisers thought they could take Iraq because it was weak and it served their political interests: an important strategic location, oil,  and a foothold to fight for our allies in the region. Demonizing Saddam Hussein was not hard to do. His earlier invasion of Kuwait mirrored that of Georgia's military incursion. Like the United States, Russia ignored diplomacy and the UN when it made the rush to war. In both Georgia and Iraq, a sovereign nation was invaded contrary to all international laws with very little support from other nations. But invasions usually do not turn out the way the invaders desire. Russia should remember the lessons from its invasion of Afghanistan. And certainly, the disaster of post-invasion Iraq should serve as a warning to what can easily happen after a "successful" attack.

Instead of recognizing that the U.S. war and occupation of Iraq served as a model for Russia, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice recently denounced Russian's invasion of Georgia. Rice said, "This is not 1968 and the invasion of Czechoslovakia, where Russia can threaten its neighbors, occupy a capital, overthrow a government, and get away with it."

Our hypocritical policies have never been so starkly evident. The Georgian crisis may only be the first to emulate Bush's invasion of Iraq in the post-Cold War era. Hopefully our next president will demonstrate that the policies and words of George Bush and Condoleezza Rice are an American aberration, and not an example. The world cannot afford to live by Athenian "justice" anymore.

Adil E. Shamoo, a Foreign Policy In Focus senior analyst, is a professor at the University of Maryland School of Medicine. He writes on ethics and public policy. Bonnie Bricker is an FPIF contributor writing on issues of politics and public policy.

 

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Published by Foreign Policy In Focus (FPIF), a project of the Institute for Policy Studies (IPS, online at www.ips-dc.org). Copyright © 2009, Institute for Policy Studies.

Recommended citation:
Adil E. Shamoo and Bonnie Bricker, "Georgia, Iraq, and Athenian Justice,"(Washington, DC: Foreign Policy In Focus, September 9, 2008).

Web location:
http://fpif.org/fpiftxt/5522

Production Information:
Author(s): Adil E. Shamoo and Bonnie Bricker
Editor(s): Erik Leaver
Production: Erik Leaver

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Editor's Note: FPIF.org editors read and approve each comment. Comments are checked for content only; spelling and grammar errors are not corrected and comments that include vulgar language or libelous content are rejected.
 
Name If Russia Had NOT----? Date: Oct 13, 2008
There was a terrible massacre going on in S.Osettia and being conducted by Georgia with a massive amount of bombs and missles falling on houses in the middle of the night. Then the tanks rolled in, and rolled right over people while they were at it. Georgian's on foot went about tossing hand grenades into basements where people had gone when their homes were being bombed, hoping their basements would shelter them.

Georgia was pumped up into doing this invasion by the US who had been supplying them with funds, weapons, military deathsquad type training, including those horrible sound weapons (which are a crime against humanity, and from the USN, a terribly "genocidal" crime against whales and other sea mammals..)

The Israelis also contributed in the training, equipping and pushing of Georgia into destroying S.Osettia. There was a "war game" conducted by the US in Georgia not long before the invasion; helping them "get ready". There were US spec.ops, blackwater and MOSSAD agents participating in the invasion...

Yes, there are other considerations, but THE ABOVE take precedence over all the pipeline/NATO/encircling Russia and whatever etc., MADNESSes!

I am not the least bit "war hawkish", but must say, anyway, thank goodness Russia rolled in to intervene and stopped the massacre of S.Osettians, and prevented then also the same sort of massacre from happening to Abkhazia since they were next in the scheduled program before moving on to Iran and whatever else... This was to have been the startup of the Bushco (Cheney)(nwo)(AIPAC)(CFR) Grand Finale Big WAR, but shucks, doggone, Russia spoiled it all...(!)

Georgia continued to try to continue with their plans even after they'd been chased out of S.Osettia. They backed off just a short ways away and sat waiting for... (WHAT? for Russia to LEAVE??) They seemed to have thought that the nwo "rest of the world" would prevail upon Russia to just up and leave without any reliable, honest protection having been set up for S.Osettia and Abkhazia. Georgia continued deceitful manouevers and activities, for instance:

Setting up bands of men, some Georgians, some from other Balkan countries, dressed up in Russian uniforms and carrying leftover Russian weapons and surrounded by people toting cameras to begin committing atrocities (begin murdering) Georgian citizens which, on the videos being filmed, would appear to be Russians attacking Georgian citizens...

(just like US and Israeli "spec ops" do in Iraq, only dressed up "like Iraqis" and killing US military personnel and destroying tanks and other armored vehicles, to blame it on whichever manufactured faction they desire to blame it on at the time, even having foolishly used MOSSAD's own DU tipped roadside bomb/tank destroyer, literally making mince-meat of anyone inside any vehicle they bombed--and tried to claim these were Iranian made bombs--made with DU?)

CNN and BBC if not also others, absconded with the video that had been taken by a Russian (S.Osettian?) journalist during the 8/7-8/08 initial blitzkreig attack. I saw that film shortly after, so had no problem recognizing it when it was run a few days later by CNN and BBC falsified by their fake "news report", claiming it to be footage of Russia attacking Gori, and as if "current".

Russia took out the military base near Gori, and also the airport; they would have been foolish NOT to! The US would have been flying in resupplies and perhaps pilots and bombers too, who knows! In the Black Sea the US came to port claiming "humanitarian aid" but those ships were not stocked for that, they were warships.

So, anyway, your "assessment" that Russia's intervention which stopped the massacre of S.Osettian civilian citizens from infants to the most elderly was the same as the US unprovoked invasion, ongoing mass murder, destruction and occupation of Iraq is way off base and unjust, to say the least, and inhumane if it indicates that you think Georgia should have been left there unopposed to continue slaughtering more innocent civilian human beings.

No one else was stopping it, so why are you using it in a way that casts it so falsely and degradingly against Russia, a way that is contributing to demonizing Russia if not advocating for Georgia's "right" to kill as many civilians as they might like to kill?

MAKE WAR OBSOLETE! MAKE OIL OBSOLETE!
http://www.zianet.com/XLexcel/OHBOY.html

Name Anthony Petros Date: Dec 26, 2008
As hard as you try to demonize the U.S. and play down the brutal Russian regime . . . you have failed. Bush was foolish to invade Iraq, but that being said our troops were there and are trying to help the Iraqi people. Georgia is a free and independent state that didn't deserve the Stalin style invasion by Russia.
 
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